The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1887-07-30


Clarke says: "At this time parliament
decreed that common laborers without
board should have one penny per day,
equal to two cents of our money. A
chaplain to the bishop received but
three half-pence per day." The good
old days are mirage-the nearer we
approach them the more they recede
from us. In ancient times the common
poor people we're slaves, the property of
| the rich. Never in the history of the
world was the poor and laboring class
as we'll off as to-day. Yet we favor all
legitimate means to improve their con-
ditiOn. Is not the world more intemp-
crate to-day than in the past? Is there
not more drinking in the present than
in the past ? That may be true; the
population to-day is greatly increased
over the past. But in the past for the
most part everybody drank, and drunk
enness was common among Christian
people. In every house, from the cler
gymen to the layman, liquors were
deemed as a necessary part of the liv-
ing. A jug of whisky was more nee
essary than COW. A whisky mer
chant was respectable, as member of
the church, as the meat merchant or
baker. Wilson in his history says the
preachers were often paid their salaries
in barrels of whisky. 1t was indispens-
able in life and death.
In the probate records Of Boston in
1898, we read that fifty-One gallons of
wine were necessary to assist the men,
bers through the funeral of Mrs. Mary
Nortoa, wife of Rev. John Norton, one
of the first and best preachers in Bos
ton. In 1885, at the funeral of Rev.
Thomas Corbet, the mourners were very
sad and sorrowful over the death of
their beloved pastor, and to brace them
up for the occasion, it took one barrel of
wine and two barrels of cider, and as
the weather was cold, some spice and
sugar were added to the cider. Wemay
imagine the drunkenness on occasions
less solemn. AT Salem in 1928, at the
funeral of a pauper gallon of wine and
cider are charged as incidentals and the
next year six gallons of rum on another
such occasion. In 1742 so great was
the drunkenness that law was enacted
forbidding the use of rum and wine at
funerals. DIR. Lyman Beecher says in
his history of the temperance move
ment that even the Christian clergymen
who first signed the pledge only prom
Used ~teahstain from its use-on common
occasions. In solemn times he would
use it. Solemn occasions were under
stood to be weddings, church dedica-
tions, the installation of pastors, funer-
ais, etc. The liquor business, from seller
to drinker, was sustained by the Bible,
and was a Christian business. If we
go back farther we find it no better.
But to-day what a change is wrought
and is working everywhere against this
great evil! While the sin is legion the
mighty hosts of temperance are grow
ing as never before. The good men
and women of all lands and countries
are united and uniting against it, and
swear by him that liveth forever and
ever that this nefarious, debauching
traffic shall cease. The present age
boasts a force for good that will event
ually destroy this giant iniquity. Pro-
| hibitiOn is a Christian doctrine beneath
whose mighty and increasing power the
hosts of intemperance must fall. God
is in the work and cannot fail. The
prayers and hearts Of all Christian peo-
pie are in it. In Iowa it is demon
strated and glorious success, and it is
marching on to national success and
victory. The cry of the widow aud orphan
for bread, robbed by the demon alcohol
of father and husband, will never cease
till God shall bruise the head and des-
troy this old serpent. "Say not, there
fore, that the former times were better
than these"
But was not the world better in
the past in moral point of view?
Were not Christians more devOut
and godly then ? We're not those days
the good old days of true piety and
honesty? Let US see. At the begin
ming of the eighteenth century, DR..
Coleman, of Boston, pastor of one of
the first churches Of the city, 'lamented
the general decline of piety." ''The
general name Of religion is made sham
pretense for the worst of yillanies.
The perilous times are come wherein
men are lovers Of their own selves" We
go still farther back to the end of the
seventeenth century. DR., Mather la
mented the degeneracy and departing
glory of New England. Atheism and
profanity, said he, have come to a pro-
digious height. The world is full of
unbelief. He concluded a series of ser
mons with one on the 'Sin of Sleeping
during the worship of God; it is thing
too frequently practiced. Sleeping at a
sermon is a greater sin than speaking
an idle word. Therefore, if men are to
be jua ged for idle words, how much
more for sleeping in church.
In 1879 Presbyterian Synod conven-